Page 48 - ThinkandGrowRichJourney2020
P. 48

48 THINK AND GROW RICH
416 Truly, my own son has taught me that handicaps can be converted into stepping
417 stones on which one may climb toward some worthy goal, unless they are
418 accepted as obstacles, and used as alibis.
419 The little deaf boy went through the grades, high school, and college without
420 being able to hear his teachers, excepting when they shouted loudly, at close
421 range. He did not go to a school for the deaf. WE WOULD NOT PERMIT
422 HIM TO LEARN THE SIGN LANGUAGE. We were determined that he
423 should live a normal life, and associate with normal children, and we stood by
424 that decision, although it cost us many heated debates with school officials.
425 While he was in high school, he tried an electrical hearing aid, but it was of no
426 value to him; due, we believed, to a condition that was disclosed when the child
427 was six, by Dr. J. Gordon Wilson, of Chicago, when he operated on one side of
428 the boy's head, and discovered that there was no sign of natural hearing
429 equipment. During his last week in college, (eighteen years after the operation),
430 something happened which marked the most important turning-point of his life.
431 Through what seemed to be mere chance, he came into possession of another
432 electrical hearing device, which was sent to him on trial. He was slow about
433 testing it, due to his disappointment with a similar device. Finally he picked the
434 instrument up, and more or less carelessly, placed it on his head, hooked up the
435 battery, and lo! as if by a stroke of magic, his lifelong DESIRE FOR NORMAL
436 HEARING BECAME A REALITY! For the first time in his life he heard
437 practically as well as any person with normal hearing. "God moves in mysterious
438 ways, His wonders to perform."
439 Overjoyed because of the Changed World which had been brought to him
440 through his hearing device, he rushed to the telephone, called his mother, and
441 heard her voice perfectly. The next day he plainly heard the voices of his
442 professors in class, for the first time in his life! Previously he could hear them
443 only when they shouted, at short range. He heard the radio. He heard the talking
444 pictures. For the first time in his life, he could converse freely with other people,
445 without the necessity of their having to speak loudly. Truly, he had come into




































































   46   47   48   49   50